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Bay City, Texas

7 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1951 and the latest in 1974. It stands in the Bay City census division. It lies in ZIP code area 77414. The Survey maps it on the Bay City quadrangle. 18,061 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 52 feet above sea level.

Research this city

Bay City within Matagorda County

On record in Bay City

Buildings and businesses the archive holds for this place. Each opens its own page, with the source record it came from.

On the National Register 6 records

Population over time

3 figures

Bay City fell from 18,667 to 18,061 between 2000 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.

YearPeople Change
200018,667
201017,614-1,053 (-6%)
202018,061+447 (+3%)

Topographic sheets covering this place

5 surveys from 7 printed sheets

Matched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.

Fires near this place

4 since 2012

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 4 fires within 5 miles of Bay City between 2012 and 2013, burning about 2,512 acres in total. None started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause Fires
Missing data/not specified/undetermined2
Misuse of fire by a minor1
Debris and open burning1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

DateCause SizeReported by Name on the report
19 August 2013Debris and open burning2,500 acresTexas A & M Forest ServiceRUNNELS RANCH
18 August 2012Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreTexas A & M Forest ServiceFRANKSON RD
13 March 2013Misuse of fire by a minor12 acresTexas A & M Forest ServiceOVV RD RICE FIRE
26 December 2012Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreTexas A & M Forest ServiceCR 109 - 112

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Matagorda County

Storms near this place

30 since 1993

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Bay City in 30 storm reports between 1993 and 2013: 12 hail, 11 thunderstorm wind, 4 flash flood, 3 funnel cloud. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

WhenEvent Place namedHarm What the report says
September 2002Flash FloodBay City$75,000Water in homes in Bay City.
April 2002Thunderstorm WindBay City$50,000Power poles were knocked down in Bay City with thousands of homes losing electricity, numerous trees were down around the county, and a Chemical plant south of Bay City received minor siding damage.
December 1995Thunderstorm WindBay City$50,000Police report utility poles blown down, windows blown out, and roof damage.
September 2002Flash FloodBay City$30,000Flooded roads in Bay City and Cedar Lane due to training cells.
June 2004Flash FloodBay City$25,000Several roads flooded in and around Bay City.
April 2000Thunderstorm WindBay City$25,000Patio roof torn off and tree down.
May 2006HailBay City$20,000Hail from quarter size (1.00") to golf ball size (1.75").
April 2006Thunderstorm WindBay City$15,000Trees down between Ashwood and Pledger which damaged automotive windshield.
May 2000HailBay City$15,000no account filed
May 2006HailBay City$12,000Quarter size hail across the city.
May 1995Thunderstorm WindBay City$10,000Local sheriff reported a roof blown off in Bay City and trees down in the city.
May 1995Thunderstorm WindBay City$10,000Local sheriffs reported a roof blown off in Bay City and trees down in the city.
February 1999HailBay City$10,000no account filed
February 1999HailBay City$10,000no account filed
May 1999HailBay City$10,000no account filed
June 2004Flash FloodBay City$8,000Flooded roads in southeast side of Bay City along FM 457 and FM 2540.
April 2002HailBay City$5,000Sheriff reported 3/4 inch Hail on State Highway 60 North, to the north of Bay City.
April 1993HailBay City$5,000The Matagorda County Sheriff's Office reported 0.50- to 0.75-inch hail near Bay City and in Van Vleck.
May 2005Thunderstorm WindBay City$5,000no account filed
April 1997Thunderstorm WindBay City$5,000no account filed
May 2004Thunderstorm WindBay City$3,00050 knot wind gust downed some tree branches.
February 1998HailBay City$3,000no account filed
April 2012HailBay City$1,000Dime to quarter sized hail reported in Bay City.
April 1995HailBay City$1,000Matagorda sheriffs reported one-inch hail north of Bay City along Highway 60.
May 2001HailBay City$1,000no account filed
May 2013Thunderstorm WindBay City-This severe thunderstorm wind gust was measured at the Bay City AWOS site.
August 2006Funnel CloudBay City-Sighted near FM 2668 and lasted several minutes.
July 2005Thunderstorm WindBay City-No damage reported.
March 2004Funnel CloudBay City-no account filed
March 2004Funnel CloudBay City-no account filed

Every storm recorded in Matagorda County

Nearest settlements

The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.

Map PlaceDistance Sheets
Van Vleck4.9 miles10
Markham5.3 miles8
Caney6.2 miles7
Allenhurst6.9 miles11
Buckeye7.3 miles8
Rugeley7.9 miles7
Sugar Valley8.8 miles11
Rymers8.8 miles8

Elsewhere

Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.

Wikipedia article on Bay CityAn encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q812071The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0).

Provenance

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 1351611. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.

Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.

Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.